


A Night Out

by greygerbil



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-24
Updated: 2014-07-24
Packaged: 2018-02-10 06:24:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2014473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stacker just found out about the damage Coyote Tango did to Tamsien and him. He tells Herc about it. The evening ends worse and better than expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Night Out

**Author's Note:**

> This was written as a response to a prompt on the kinkmeme which wanted a story for a Shatterdome/Texts From Last Night picture. It showed Herc and Stacker with the text "410: We had sex after spending two hours in the drunk tank. It was really deep and meaningful."

If this wasn’t rock bottom, then Stacker didn’t want to know what came next, but he was sure life could surprise him again.

He could probably make a start and throw up on his trousers, end this evening on the same note it had been holding like a broken keyboard for the last three hours. It had taken him two large glasses of whiskey, shared with a patient Herc, before the story had spilled out of him. Why Tamsin was gone from the Shatterdome; why he wouldn’t be piloting again; why Mako might not even have a replacement father in two years’ time, if his luck took another turn for the worse; why he’d kissed Herc in the locker room three weeks ago and then had stopped holding conversations beyond procedure after he’d gotten the tests back two days later.

Herc had listened mostly in silence. There weren’t any condolences, no ‘I’m sorry’ because Herc was much too close to all this, to them, Tamsin and Stacker. Occassionally, he’d curse or close his eyes for a moment, swallowing whatever response he had in favour of lips pressed into a thin line, jaw set tight, a cracking mask his armour.

When Stacker had finished, Herc had looked at him and only said his name like it was a knife cutting into his flesh. Wordlessly, he'd refilled Stacker’s glass when Stacker had downed the remains in one gulp. There had been nothing to add, no way to make it better, so they drank until they couldn’t walk straight. Stacker liked it that way. Had Herc tried to make him see the bright side, like his commanding officers after they had given him the news, Stacker would have punched him in the face.

As they had stumbled out of the bar together, they had lost interest in making their way to the Shatterdome within minutes. The police had found them standing on a motorway bridge in the rain, leaning over the railing and watching the racing lights of the cars blurr in colourful motion before they vanished into the night. It later occured to Stacker someone might have called the cops because they were worried one of them would jump. If he’d been tempted then only because Herc had mentioned that looking at it was a shade like the drift and Stacker had remembered that he would never again been filled with the endless, amazing stream of someone’s memories and fantasies and feelings, coursing through him, making him see the world with eyes that weren’t his.

The police hadn't recognised them. They had no ID on them and gave false names. Circumstances made for much in such situations, Stacker knew. One couldn’t fault them for not recognising two men who were in the papers every other week, given the state they had been in. A month ago, he hadn't expected himself to be picked up by the cops wet to the bone and too drunk to make his way back home, either. 

The cell of the drunk tank was empty except for Herc and one stranger. The guy wore a band shirt and tangled blue hair to his shoulders, which laid like a cobweb over his face as he was stretched out on the wooden bench on the other side of the room, looking deathly pale in the clinical light, breath shallow.

Herc, sitting next to Stacker, was staring a hole into the naked concrete wall.

It was a pretty sobering experience to say the least. Did its job, then.

“I’m sorry about this,” Stacker finally said, lifting his face from his cupped hands.

“Why? I’m completely pissed, too.” Herc pinched the bridge of his nose and turned his head. “I should’ve been the one to keep it together.”

Stacker grunted. “If you’d just watched me drinking, I’d have felt even more pathetic than I already do.”

And then, after all, he knew Herc was suffering for him, with him. When he’d asked Herc to join him for a trip to the bar, he hadn’t wanted therapy, he’d wanted his friend.

“I think you could’ve spent the last three weeks drunk and no one could’ve blamed you, mate.”

Stacker folded his hands again, fingers threading together, elbows on his thighs, leaning his chin against the knuckles that stood pale against his skin. “Tamsin will die.” He hadn’t even wanted to agree with Herc, but he did, in a way, his brain stumbling through the fog and pinpointing the exact reason why it hurt so fucking much. The words were as inornate as the cell they were in (a brick floor with cracks, exposed wiring nine feet above where the light shone white and harsh and left no speck of merciful shadow for him to cower in). “I’m going to die.”

An arm wrapped around his hunched shoulders, at first hesitant, touching lightly against his back, then stronger as Herc grabbed his shoulder, pulling Stacker against his side. Stacker closed his eyes. Warmth radiated off Herc’s body.

_I’m going to die. Mako will be alone again._

Muddled with alcohol, he couldn’t rationalise, calm down or ignore. The fear that flooded him was basic and animal, every muscle like a steel cord under his skin as he breathed deep to get a grip on himself.

Herc got to his feet. For an irrational, devastating moment, Stacker thought he might go, leave him, unable to watch him crumble, as disappointed with Stacker as Stacker was with himself. But then there was a soft rustle of clothes and as he opened his eyes, Herc knelt before him on the ground, between his knees, and put his arms around Stacker’s neck, pulling him in.

Stacker slid off the bench into his arms with little more resistance. One of Herc’s hands was on the back of his head, gently pressing Stacker’s forehead against his shoulder, hiding Stacker from the world, or maybe the world from Stacker. His embrace was iron, too tight, awkwardly unpractised. Stacker smelled rain and whiskey and motor oil. He let Herc hold him together.

They must’ve sat minutes like this in complete silence until Stacker felt like he had ground under his feet again and pulled back just a little, gently knocking his forehead against Herc’s.

“Faggots.”

The blue-haired man had sat up at some point and now looked at them, his eyebrows drawn together as if they were in his personal bedroom.

Stacker heard Herc gather a hissing breath, the tension in his body doubling. He let go off Stacker, turning like a heat seaking missile zeroing in.

“You really wanna do this?” His voice was gravelly and strained and Stacker realised that when he had been close to tears, Herc had been right with him. The Australian rose to his feet, his whole muscular frame unfolding, hand flexing as he took half a step closer. “Just gimme an excuse, boy.”

The ‘boy’ in question was probably their age, but you wouldn’t have known, the way he shrunk back against the wall. Stacker picked himself up from the floor and put a hand on Herc’s back. Herc was just a bit too controlled to do more than posturing at the police station, but he was pretty drunk and besides, a little good cop, bad cop never hurt with wankers like this.

“We have to get out of here,” Stacker noted quietly, after Herc had thrown a last murderous glance at the stranger. Looking at Herc, Stacker realised he actually wanted to try and leave, wasn’t just following autopilot on the most sensible next thing to do. It wasn’t any monumental step forward, but he couldn’t remember that level of motivation for anything in the last three weeks. It had nothing to do with being drunk, either. “Someone will guess who we are eventually. The press will hear about it.”

“Never stopped Scott, did it?” Herc muttered, but he ran a hand over his face, obviously trying to come up with something constructive. “An officer passes by every ten minutes or so,” he finally supplied. “Maybe if we seem presentable enough?”

*

Stacker was actually impressed with himself that he managed to convince the cop, but then, he’d learned to function effectively in battle while shaking head to toe from a horrible memory torn to shreds and spread between the co-pilots, and while watching kaiju blue eat its way through the walls, and while standing knee-deep in water that was slowly filling the conn-pod, and while he was so terribly alone and feeling deaf and lost as Tamsin had suddenly gone silent in the drift. All a matter of perspective, really. This balding, middle-aged man was no Onibaba. Still, if Herc hadn’t pulled an address of one of Scott’s drinking buddies out of his head real fast as a place they’d go to and crash, he didn’t think they’d have been let go yet.

They promised to call a cab and then walked anyway. The fresh night air and drizzle cleared his head some more. He watched Herc trudging by his side whenever a car's lights would illuminate him for a few seconds. There were dark blotches from the motorway bridge railing across Herc’s old henley, some liquor had stained his threadbare jeans and the leather boots crunched on the small unpaved path next to the highway that passed by the Shatterdome and which they now followed.

When the Shatterdome was in sight, Stacker finally forced the words out of himself. “Herc,” he said, with false calm, “about us.”

“Shove it, Stacks,” Herc said. “I’m not mad. Y’think I don’t see you have other things to worry about?”

Stacker ignored him.

“It wasn’t fair to leave you hanging for almost a month, but I don’t think we can do this.”

“I understand,” Herc said. It sounded tired and kind, which made it worse.

“I don’t want to do this to you,” Stacker tried again, though Herc had spared him the plea for an explanation. Another car passed; another brief flash of Herc’s face, ghostly pale in the light. “You lost Angela three years ago. You’d lose me, too. I don't think I have more than ten years, best case.”

They waited until they didn’t hear any cars, then crossed the highway and walked the broad street towards the Shatterdome's west entrance. After a while, Stacker was sure Herc would just keep quiet.

“That’s all? I don’t care, Stacker.” Herc caught himself with a huff, a shadow of his hand pressing against his forehead in the dark. “Look, I don’t mean – Christ, you know I’m shit at words. ‘course I care what will happen to you, but it’s not like we were ever safe.”

“It’s not the same. I can’t fight this. I can’t win.”

Because in a Jaeger, he could fight a Kaiju. He might get crushed like an empty can, but then, he’d made it out victorious up to now, more or less. Bad odds, sure, but not impossible. There was no way to go up against this, though. That made him sick about it; that he’d spent all his life fighting and now there was nothing he could do but wait for the cancer to eat him up from inside. As a warrior, he knew who he was. As a warrior, he was worthy to match Herc. Now, he felt weak and defenseless.

Herc breathed in audibly.

“Maybe a Kaiju paints the coastline with me tomorrow. Maybe a Cat-3 steps on you. Or maybe you – die of radiation poisoning. The point is...” Stacker thought he could hear every solitary word wrench itself from Herc’s throat, so slow did they come, and without the alcohol to smoothen the way, maybe they’d have never made it out at all. But Herc continued, softly: “If I got to have ten years with you, or two, or even a week, it’d be a gift.”

Stacker could have blamed it on the whiskey, but that was nonsense. He’d have kissed Herc either way.

*

They ended up in Stacker’s quarters where Mako’s bed was empty, since she and Chuck staid with Scott for the night. Stacker had his own narrow cot at the other side of the room, which was only large enough when he moved to sit between Herc’s legs as Herc kissed his jaw.

Drinking to the point of stupidity, walking seven miles, the shadow of death on them left them heavy and tired in each other’s arms, all movements slow and desperately close. Herc was nothing but hard muscle as he uncovered him, humming when Stacker’s rain-cold fingers trailed a scar on his side. His henley ended up bunched under his arms whereas Stacker’s button-down shirt slid off easily enough. Herc palmed Stacker through the fabric of his dress trousers and Stacker pushed him into the mattress as Herc's strong thighs came to press against his sides.

They never did go through the trouble of removing their trousers. After a little fumbling with his own belt, Herc took them both in hand as Stacker explored Herc’s mouth with his tongue. They rutted against each other, into his hand. Stacker pinned him with his weight and it was a promise of what he’d do with him tomorrow night, when his head wasn’t swimming. One of Herc’s legs leaned sideways, opening for him, and Stacker cupped his knee, enjoying the invitation; Herc’s other leg was trapped between Stacker’s body and the wall. They were restrained men both, their half-swallowed panting the only sound in the room.

Herc kissed the look of concentration from Stacker’s face before he tightened his arms around him, fingers pressing bruises into his back. He came with a quiet curse. Stacker drowned his own noise in Herc’s mouth.

After he'd cleaned them up with a tissue, Herc was zipping up his jeans and looking at him from the corner of his eyes.

“Is this bed big enough?”

Can I stay here tonight, Stacker translated as he dropped the tissue in the paper bin.

“Of course.”

***

Stacker disentangled himself from their heap of limbs and sheets at six thirty for a date with Command, who were currently a few timezones away. He’d told Herc yesterday and somehow, through his head pounding like a drum machine, Herc still remembered. By the time Stacker was out of the bathroom again, around twenty minutes later, Herc had forced himself to sit upright, though lifting his head was still too much to ask.

Fingers gently scratched the back of his neck. “I’ve got some pills against headaches in the bathroom,” Stacker said. Herc glanced up at him. Stacker was in his parade uniform, clean-shaven, bright-eyed and for all the world an exemplary soldier.

“How d’you look like that after a bottle of whiskey and three hours of sleep?”

“I never get hangovers.”

“Bastard.” Stacker was still rubbing the back of his neck and he smiled. That felt like a win. And easy. Much easier than Herc had feared. The last time he woke up next to a lover was the day Angela died.

“What does the brass want from you?”

“Reassign tasks. They want to keep me in the PPDC, something in command.”

“They’d be stupid not to.” Herc struggled to his feet. “I’ll check on Mako and Chuck. They probably won’t be up for breakfast, knowing Scott.”

Stacker kissed his mouth despite the hangover breath Herc must have, so he guessed that meant they were together now. His heart was going a little faster.

*

Scott Hansen, being about seventeen at heart at over thirty years, was the perfect guy to watch preteens for a night. He fed them too many sweets and staid up with them until three o’clock playing M-rated video games. Now, Herc would rather leave Mako and Chuck with a pack of wolves than give them to Scott for a period of time that needed him to take any more responsibility than entertaining them for a few hours, but at that he was very skilled. When he had watched them, they came too late to meet their private teacher, still had chocolate bars in their pockets and grinned about some silly secret kept from their fathers. They were acting like kids and Mako and Chuck generally did too little of that, so that was alright.

Herc found them fast asleep in his and Chuck’s cabin. Spread-eagled on his bed, his son was in his day clothes and had one hand on Max the puppy, who curled on his pillow. Mako was in Herc’s bed wearing her pyjamas and Scott’s combat boots. There were six cardboard Burger King crowns arranged like the eyes of a die on the ground. Herc wondered if it was worth asking.

After carefully closing the door, he made his way to the mess hall, joining the crowd of groggy graveyard shift staff and those who were next in line to get to their posts. Scott bumped the edge of his tray into Herc’s back as he was just considering whether he could stomach a toast.

“Well, look at you!” Brushing shoulder-length hair out of his face, Scott grinned, blue eyes twinkling. “You get on the wrong side of thirty-five and suddenly my big brother is out partying all night. God bless the midlife crisis!”

“Funny.”

“Thanks.”

Herc grabbed a bottle of watter and followed Scott down the stairs to the main floor of the mess hall.

“So, how did it go? Did Stacker finally remove that stick from your ass and replace it with his own?”

Herc loved his brother, but he wished he could drift like Stacker, never showing his hand. There was a good reason he hadn’t told Scott about people he was attracted to before he’d had him in his head.

“Louder, Scott, I don’t think everyone’s heard you yet.”

Herc’s flat hand met the back of Scott’s head when his little brother opened his mouth and took a deep breath. 

“You can tell me what happened or I’m going fishing for it in the test drift today,” Scott said, hopping down the last stairs.

Herc sighed. He pointed his thumb over to a corner where the broken furniture stood piled up against the wall, away from prying ears.

“Tamsin and Stacker,” he said quietly, after they’d walked over. He was weighing how much he wanted to say and how much he’d let Scott catch in the drift so no one could eavesdrop; and how much he could bring himself to speak out loud right now because it still turned his stomach. “That thing in Japan was worse than expected. They’re not going to jockey again.”

“Oh.” Scott was at least decent enough to sound genuinely taken aback – even if Tamsin had rejected him about three thousand times, which he’d accepted with as much grace as a spoiled high school-aged brat.

“He told me about all about it. Then we got drunk and ended up in detox-“

“Stop right there.” Scott snapped back to a grin. “You and Mr Pentecost, the only guy in the PPDC who is more of a hardass than you, you-“

“Yes,” Herc interrupted him, glowering.

Scott barked out a laugh. “Oh man, I should have been there!”

“In detox? You were. I think I picked you up half a dozen times before you turned 18, and that’s just when I stopped counting,” Herc said testily.

Scott waved his hand. “Whatever, you don’t get to bitch at me anymore. What happened after that?”

“Well, we went home.”

“And?”

“To his room and we didn’t sleep in separate beds. Enough?”

Scott clasped his shoulder. “Brother, you got laid for the first time in years, even if you both had to be absolutely shitfaced to convince yourselves to do it. I’m proud.”

Herc frowned. “We didn’t just drop into bed together. It’s more.”

“Yeah, you spent a couple of hours in the drunk tank and staggered home to fuck. I’m sure it was really deep and meaningful. Now, if you’ll excuse me,” Scott nodded at two female engineers who had just sat down at the closest empty table, “since you’re in the race now, I gotta make sure I keep ahead of you on the number count.”

Herc listened with half an ear as Scott brought out one of his stock twenty-five flirting lines and joined the engineers, uninvited. He'd just unscrewed the cap of his water bottle when he saw Stacker pass through the double-winged entrance door. Stacker swept his gaze through the room and as he spotted Herc, he gestured at him to come closer.

Herc took a sip of water and made his way over, ignoring Scott mouthing ‘lapdog’ at him as he passed him by. _Deep and meaningful_. Scott’s constant mocking had long ceased to truly bother him, but he thought about the words for a second. Meaningful, yeah. Deep? Well, Herc didn’t think he was. All he knew was that when he was at Stacker’s side, he was content. However many days Stacker had left, he’d make sure they’d be as damned good as they could be.


End file.
